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October 31, 2019.

Last week,  Washington DC was the scene of the 70th International Astronautical Congress (IAC), the annual fall event that connects key players in the development and exploration of outer space. Public and private organizations from all across the world were in attendance, as well as noted policymakers, thought leaders, advocates, and visionaries . NASA had a major presence at this event, and many of Stellar’s Civil Programs staff who support the TPMS contract at NASA Headquarters were intendance along with Richard Rogers, VP for Civil Programs and Mohamed Yousif,  Director for MENA (Middle East/North Africa).

Stellar Presenters and Co-Authors

As part of the IAC 2019 Technical Programme, several Stellar personnel presented or were co-authors of technical papers.

A5 IAA SYMPOSIUM ON HUMAN EXPLORATION OF SOLAR SYSTEM, Sess. 4-D2.8: Space Transp. Solutions for Deep Space

EmPowering Innovation: The Gateway Power and Propulsion Element Public-Private Partnership.. Ronald Ticker (NASA), Christopher Zavrel (Stellar), Kathleen Schubert (NASA), David Frate, (NASA), David Manzella (NASA) _______________________

B3 IAF HUMAN SPACEFLIGHT SYMPOSIUM, Session 1: Governmental Human Spaceflight Programs (Overview)

NASA’s Human Lunar Landing Strategy. Greg Chavers (NASA), Nantel Suzuki (NASA), Marshall Smith (NASA), Lisa Watson-Morgan (NASA), Steve Clarke (NASA), Walt Engelund (NASA), Lindsay Aitchison(NASA), Shawn McEniry,  Laura Means, Michael DeKlotz (Stellar), Shanessa Jackson (Stellar) _______________________

B3 IAF HUMAN SPACEFLIGHT SYMPOSIUM, Session 7. Advanced Systems, Technologies & Innovations for Human Spaceflight

NextSTEP Habitat Risk Reduction for Gateway. Tracy Gill (NASA), Michael Ching (Stellar), James Clawson (Stellar), Alexandra Cross (Stellar), Elisabeth Moore (NASA), Mark Dillard, NASA, Paul Kesslern (NASA), Douglas Craig (NASA) _______________________

D4. IAA SYMP. VISIONS & STRATEGIES FOR  FUTURE, Session 2: Contr. of Space Activities to Solving Global Societal Issues

Thriving In and From Space for All Humankind. Marguerite Broadwell (NASA), Shobhana Gupta (NASA), Denise Silimon-Hill (Stellar)  _______________________

E1. IAF SPACE EDUCATION & OUTREACH SYMPOSIUM, Session  5: Enabling the Future – Developing the Space Workforce

Revolutionary Aerospace Systems Concepts Academic Linkage (RASC-AL) Challenge. Carol Galica (Stellar), John Guidi (NASA), Patrick Troutman (NASA), Shelley Spears (NIA), Stacy Dees (NIA) _______________________

E3. IAA SYMPOSIUM ON SPACE POLICY, REGULATIONS & ECONOMICS, Session 2. 50 Years After Apollo 11: The Future of

Women in Exploration: Lessons from the Past as Humanity Reaches Deep Space. Shanessa Jackson (Stellar), Patricia Knezek (NASA), Denise Silimon-Hill (Stellar), Alexandra Cross (Stellar) _______________________

E3. IAA SYMPOSIUM ON SPACE POLICY, REGULATIONS & ECONOMICS, Session 6. Economics of Procurement in Space

Gateway Program Acquisition Strategy Overview. Emma Lehnhardt (NASA),  Christopher Zavrel (Stellar), Douglas Craig (NASA), Nicole Hermann (NASA)  _______________________

In addition, numerous students affiliated with Stellar-supported NASA University Engagement programs presented as part of the Student Symposium.

NASA Exhibit Support

NASA presented three major exhibit areas including a primary agency exhibit, a “Driven To Explore” Mobile Exhibit, and Physical Sciences Informatics area.  The Stellar team at NASA HQ was instrumental in planning and staffing the NASA presence at IAC.

Denise Hill and Valerie Chabot	Mohamed Yousif
Mike Ching	Chris Zavrel
Zach Talpas

Program Highlights

In its prior 70 years, this major international conference has been held in the U.S. only four other times – the last being in 2002 which was the 53rd IAC in Houston. Before that, the 43rd IAC (1992) took place in DC, the 19th IAC (1968) was held in New York, and the 12th IAC (1961) occurred in DC. As Mike Lencioni previously noted,  this year the Honorable Mike Pence, Vice President of the United States (and chair of the National Space Council) delivered welcome remarks as part of the IAC Opening Ceremony for delegates.

Heads of Major Space Agencies were also in attendance:

• Jim Bridenstine, NASA Administrator
• Johann-Dietrich Woerner, Director General of European Space Agency (ESA)
• Hiroshi Yamakawa, President of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA)
• Sylvain Laporte, President of the Canadian Space Agency (CSA)
• Sergey Krikalev, Executive Director for Piloted Spaceflights for Roscosmos (Russian Space Agency)
• S. Somanath, Director of Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO)

Other ESA members were also heavily involved or represented, such as Belgian Space, Centre National D’Etudes Spatiales (CNES), German Aerospace Center (DLR),  Italian Space Agency, Luxembourg Space Agency, Romanian Space Agency, Netherlands Institute for Space Research (SRON), Polish Space Agency (POLSA), Swedish Space Corporation, and contingents representing Spain and the UK. In addition, many  new and emerging space agencies were represented at the conference, to include Australian Space Agency, Israel Space Agency (ISA), Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI), Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre (MBRSC) and United Arab Emirates Space Agency (UAESA), Singapore Space and Technology Association, South African National Space Agency (SANSA), and the New Zealand Space Agency (NZSA).

In addition, many of Stellar’s partners and customers took part in the congress—too many to name! 

Congratulations to the team for a job well done!

October 20, 2019.

Stellar Solutions’ humanitarian R&D initiative, QuakeFinder, is reviewing data from stations near two earthquakes in California that occurred on October 14 and 15. In addition, California unveiled the first statewide earthquake early warning system to provide seconds to tens of seconds of alert based on seismic observation. Its release coincides with the 30th anniversary on October 17 of the massive 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake.

This devastating, historic event is what prompted Stellar Solutions to devise the innovative placement of sensors for pre-seismic underground electromagnetic disturbances. The resulting QuakeFinder network has collected data on over 1000 earthquakes during the past two decades with the goal of developing the capability to predict earthquakes days to weeks prior. Read the latest QuakeFinder blog here:

October 12, 2019.

Celeste Ford, Founder and Board Chair of Stellar Solutions, Inc., a global aerospace engineering services leader, will be honored with the inaugural Silicon Valley “Woman of Wisdom” Award by the Palo Alto Chamber of Commerce.

She will accept the award at the organization’s annual Athena Awards luncheon on November 7, 2019 at the Garden Court Hotel.

The Silicon Valley “Woman of Wisdom” Award was established by the Palo Alto Chamber of Commerce to recognize a distinguished professional whose exceptional career serves as an inspiration for others in her field.

“Celeste Ford reflects the innovation and entrepreneurship ethos of Silicon Valley. She carved out a career as an aerospace engineer when few women were in the field. She has developed a thriving, internationally-recognized company. And she is dedicated to expanding the role of young women in STEM. Taken together, she is an icon of inspiration to our city and the nation,” said Judy Kleinberg, President of the Palo Alto Chamber of Commerce and the Chamber Foundation.

Congratulation, Celeste!

Read the full press releae here: https://www.prweb.com/releases/celeste_ford_chair_of_stellar_solutions_inc_wins_first_ever_silicon_valley_woman_of_wisdom_award/prweb16636384.htm

October 11, 2019.

We are excited to report that NASA’s Ionospheric CONnection Explorer (ICON) mission successfully launched last night and is now in orbit. During the first pass of the Northrop Grumman L-1011 Stargazer through the launch zone, the Pegasus XL drop was aborted; they circled around and on the next lap the launch was successful. All three Pegasus rocket stages performed nominally, and the ICON satellite ultimately separated and is now circling Earth on its mission to study the frontier of space. Read NASA’s press release here.

Led by University of California Berkeley and PI Thomas Immel with support from Stellar, ICON is managed by NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and will help us learn more about the dynamic zone called the ionosphere, high in our atmosphere where terrestrial weather from below meets space weather above, or “our interface to space”.

ICON carries four instruments to collect images of the ionosphere and directly measure characteristics of the space environment. This region of space is a critical part of how we transmit and receive data, and its fluctuations can distort and disrupt those signals with catastrophic effects. Much remains to be learned about the ionosphere’s makeup, behavior, and variability due to external influences, and the ICON spacecraft will be the first to study how the space environment is connected to conditions in our atmosphere and weather.

Stellar has supported UC Berkeley’s Space Sciences Laboratory in the planning and implementation of this mission during all phases. ICON is a science mission, but there is a lot of engineering going on behind the scenes to make it all happen, and that’s where Stellar Solutions comes in – providing key mission, systems, thermal, and instrument engineering expertise to our partners.

A number of Stellar personnel who have supported this mission over the years are noted below:

• Carl Yanari is currently supporting ICON as a Senior Thermal SE, as well as providing launch support and commissioning.
• Brett Stroozas (advisor) is Ops Readiness Director, preparing and running rehearsals and other readiness exercises.
• Mike DeKlotz previously served as Verification Lead and helped with ops readiness.
• Jeff Lynn (now a customer) was previously Deputy PM for one of the science instruments.
• Several other Stellar advisers served on ICON’s Internal Review Board.

A highlight of our “stellar” support is Carl Yanari who is part of Stellar’s Civil Programs team at NASA Goddard. With over 33 years of industry experience on a variety of spacecraft and instruments, he provides thermal engineering subject matter expertise for ICON, and is responsible for the overall thermal design concept, analyses, testing, implementation, and performance of the instruments and spacecraft. ICON’s unique orbit causes each side of the observatory to be illuminated by the sun at various points during the mission. This is a major challenge as the environment continually changes from hot to cold and back–but due to Carl’s exemplary support, the  thermal design will protect the hardware and ensure that the mission goals are met.

The systems and instruments Stellar has helped develop will enable scientists around the country to tackle issues affecting our way of living on Earth and in space, including human spaceflight and defense as well as the airline and telecommunications industries.

Congratulations and thanks again to Carl and our partners for a successful launch!

October 9, 2019. 

Stellar Solutions’ Vice President for Defense Programs, Betsy Pimentel, has been at the forefront of aerospace engineering, space exploration and defense throughout a career that has reached great heights in the public and private sectors.  Also notable is the fact that Pimentel got her start as part of the first U.S. Air Force Academy class of women in 1976. In 2020, as she is poised to commemorate the 40th anniversary of this first coeducational graduating class, Pimentel is commanding the interest of a generation of women and men who are eager to understand the profound roles of aerospace and technology in their future.

Pimentel has appeared on a variety of platforms, from Yahoo Finance on the occasion of the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing, to the California Council for Excellence‘s annual Leadership Symposium on innovation and performance October 4 where she was a featured speaker.  This coincides with an important milestone in history: on October 7, 1975, President Gerald Ford signed the law allowing the service academies to admit women. The first class that included women entered in 1976 and graduated in 1980. Pimentel received a Bachelor of Science from the Academy and then completed a Masters in Engineering Management form Santa Clara University with the technical portion in Electrical Engineering/Computer Science.  

“Betsy Pimentel is an outstanding leader and role model for women and men.  Her insistence on excellence and integrity in designing and completing complex missions results in projects that expand our knowledge and benefit our nation,” said Celeste Ford, Board Chair and Founder.

From her positions as Chief, Space Control Planning with the U.S. Air Force and Director of Defense Policy in the National Security Council at the White House, to advancing space system integration at Northrop Grumman, TASC Inc., and Stellar Solutions, Pimentel is a nationally-recognized leader in all aspects of space system and mission planning, systems engineering and defense program management.

After Gerald Ford signed Public Law 94-106 directing the service academies to admit women, more than 300 enrolled in the academies of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Coast Guard. The country soon went from divisive arguments in Congress and resistance from the Department of Defense on the prospect of allowing these women in, to the Air Force selecting the first woman aviator for Test Pilot School in 1982. Just a few years later, six Air Force women served as pilots, copilots and boom operators during military operations in Libya during 1986, the same year that the Air Force Academy saw its first female top graduate. This progression is symbolic of “forming a more perfect union” – continuing together as individuals, communities, and a nation to strive and innovate across all levels of the human condition.

The dedication and courage of these trailblazers paved the way not only in the military but across all of society. Even today, women remain extraordinarily underrepresented in the industry C-Suite particularly as the seniority increases among those top level positions. Betsy Pimentel has persevered in this area as well, as one of those few top level female executives in the male dominated areas like technology and national defense. 

She has shared knowledge and wisdom on important issues such as: 

• The evolving importance of space in the Defense and Intelligence arenas where Betsy is well known for her contributions over the years. 
• How the proliferation of communications, video and audio technologies is changing the dynamics and landscape of space exploration and how this will lead to new discoveries. 
• How the role of women has grown from the time when Stellar Solutions Founder and Board Chair Celeste Ford was one of the few women in the control center launching satellites, to today when female aerospace engineers are a vital component of the workforce. 
• How the pursuit of a return to the moon and even Mars is energizing the next generation of aerospace engineers. 
• How commercial organizations and international partnerships are joining the government in driving space exploration.

As we consider the future of civilization and humanity, including sending the first woman beyond low-Earth orbit to the Moon and possibly Mars, the stories and lessons of women like Betsy Pimentel are a key part of the incredible journey.